The F-35 wouldn’t carry the drone(s). The UCLASS is huge, it will essentially be an autonomous wingman. It would launch from a carrier (or wherever) just like the F-35 and they would fly the mission together, only with the F-35 directing the drone on how to behave. The drone would only need to match the F-35 in cruise…

Thats one location for the cameras, there are a few others that are fairly obvious, and almost certainly some that are not. The exact configuration isn’t known, but we do know from the accounts of users of the system that they provide a fair coverage of the entire aree the pilot’s head can track. We also know that the…

It’s intended to replace the F-16, so it will be used for dogfighting. We tried to ditch dogfighting before and it got a lot of planes dead and a lot of pilots killed.

There’s INS and various other normal navigation systems as well.

Yes, they are generally mechanical:

What if they were 16" railguns?

It’s possible comms could be jammed on the F-35 (though point to point in theater links should be harder to disrupt), or GPS could be taken out. GPS going down is a big deal for our bombs, but planes have inertial navigation systems that let them figure out where they are based on their acceleration. Those aren’t as…

Each of those turrets requires 100 people to operate (you’d really want an auto loader), and you’d have to build new ammo factories, since obviously no one is making 16" shells. All that ammo is also a huge vulnerability for the ship. Ask Iowa about that:

Back in 1989, on my first West Pac, we were part of the New Jersey battle group. We participated in a huge exercise up in the north Pacific and while we were up there, the battleships were cleared to fire their big guns again after the Iowa investigation was completed. We were astern of the New Jersey by probably 3-4…

I don’t think it’s an either/or proposition. The Pentagon is investing heavily in unmanned systems, but you can’t bend the laws of physics. Beaming a signal to a satellite and then bouncing it to another satellite and then beaming it back to a control room is never going to be instantaneous.

Iowas are done. On the flip side though, the Zumwalt class is probably much bigger than you think:

Fuck that, (Iowa) railgun platform time.

I don’t know whether this terrifies me or excites me. Probably a little bit of both.

The problem is the F-35 isn’t the paradigm shift. Its the stepping stone to one. Its the catalyst for one.

Or their planes, but my initial point was that as far as I know pilots, planes and the equipment (fuel, weapons, etc.) are largely interchangeable, so it seems strange to have one item that is absolutely not interchangeable and have it be as basic an item as the helmet.

A lot, and I mean a LOT of the criticism has nothing to do with vietnam, or the superiority of any existing air frame. It has to do with the repeated historical failure of one size fits all solutions to a problem. They get really expensive and they work like shit is the usual result. The bulk of F-35 criticism comes…

Yup....f35 pilot targets enemy plane, goes to fire aam, but when he selects firing menu he gets his field of view spammed by Russian dating sites and gets advised that his f35s hard drive is full and that if he clicks here he can get it scanned and optimised for free.....

It’s hard to imagine that such a helmet isn’t a classic example of information overload/ input saturation. Having a data source that provides numerous system and situational awareness profiles results in an instantaneous flood to the user that can swamp even the most highly trained pilot.

Stop pretending that the S-400 is invincible. It’s a SAM system, and just like any other SAM it emits a ton of electromagnetic energy and is very easy to find. In any conflict it would be the very first target to be destroyed.

A. Hostiles are identified using diginite???